I like a lightweight audio book when I'm walking, and I admit this fit the bill: no great lessons or revelations, just a self-aggrandizing story released 50 years after the events apparently took place, long after anyone else is still alive to dispute the facts.
So apparently, a 23 year old nobody, acting as the Third Assistant Director (a self-described gopher) on The Prince and the Showgirl, is the only one who can talk Marilyn Monroe into finally believing in herself. Not only that, but Colin Clark gets Marilyn to stop taking pills, to stop listening to the questionable advice of her hangers-on, to stand up to Laurence Olivier, to come to a deeper understanding of her husband (Arthur Miller at the time), and to show up on set on time and ready to work. And not only that, but Clark holds her hand through a miscarriage and refuses all sexual advances from "the most famous movie star in the world".
If one can believe every word Colin Clark says, it's even sadder to hear in the appendix that near the end of her life, Marilyn tried to get in touch with him one last time. After struggling with himself, should he call her back? shouldn't he? (why wouldn't he??), he was relieved when no one answered the phone.
He ends with:
It wasn't that I'd abandoned her, certainly not in my heart. It's just that there was no one left to save her.
Poor Marilyn. Time had run out.
Like I said, I like a lightweight audio book when I'm walking, but this one was a bit of a strain on the rolling eyeballs, most especially when the baritone British narrator put on his breathy Marilyn voice. There they go again, straining and rolling…
